The Way We Were
by Cal reflector
Summary: Ichigo and Tatsuki learn that two of their old friends are getting wed, anxiety, memories, and fluff ensues. Related to the stories Just Barely and Pick and Choose.


**The Way We Were**

"I'm home Brrr… It's freezing today!" Unraveling the scarf from her neck, Tatsuki shucked out of her heavy clothing and made a beeline for the kotatsu in the small living room, sighing as she slipped underneath the blankets, placing her feet right under the blessed source of heat.

Sitting across the table was Ichigo, taking a break from his professor's notes to sort through the day's pile of mail. "Welcome home. How did practice go today?"

Tatsuki poured herself tea from the table and blew against the hot surface as she wrapped her fingers around the cup. "One of my girls injured herself today during drill. She'll be out a week at least."

"That's too bad." Through his reading glasses, Ichigo narrowed his eyes at the coupons for a new pizza delivery service before tossing it into the recycle bin. "Think your team will be ready for the season opener?"

"I don't know…" Tatsuki reached for half of the remaining pile, quickly spotting and casting out the cosmetics and spa advertisements. "They're eager to work but inexperienced, just like I am as a coach. I just hope I won't go too hard on them."

Ichigo chuckled. "From personal experience, I think they'll survive… just barely."

The karate instructor reached across the small table and punched her companion in the shoulder. "Hey, I always went easy on you."

"Not since I beat you for the first time you didn't."

"Hmph." Returning her attention to the stack before her, her eyes fell on a small envelope with ornate violet trimming addressed in handwriting to Ichigo and herself. Opening the seal carefully, she began reading. "On Saturday the twenty-first of April, you're invited to Ishida Uryuu and Inoue Orihime's ……! Ichigo!"

"What?"

Tatsuki leapt from her seat and dropped to her knees beside him, thrusting the violet piece of paper in front of his face. "This! Their wedding invitation! They're getting married!"

Ichigo's browsed through the message silently. "So it seems. I guess Ishida's gamble paid off."

"I can't believe it! Wait, you knew of this?" When her childhood friend nodded, her expression darkened. "How come no one told me?"

Ichigo shrugged. "Inoue probably wanted to surprise you."

"… And she would let you know but keep it from me?"

Ichigo saw the hurt on Tatsuki's expression and responded quickly. "No, no, she didn't tell me a thing. I heard from Ishida."

Tatsuki lifted her face from its downcast position. "From him? When?"

"About two months ago. He drove down from Tokyo and called me up. You had a lecture to go to that evening. We went to a coffee shop."

"What did he say to you?"

"He told me… as soon as he finished Medical school, he was going to propose to Inoue."

By then, Tatasuki had settled back into the Kotatsu, stretching her legs alongside Ichigo's underneath the blankets and bumping her toes against his. "He drove four hours just to tell you that? Why?"

"That's what I asked him. It's not as if he needed my permission, perhaps he felt he did, said he wanted to know I was okay with it."

"And then?"

"I said sure, and wished him good luck. Then he left." A long moment of silence passed while Ichigo looked down at the table and Tatsuki at him, her hands resting beneath her chin. "I mean, what was he thinking, you know? The person to ask would have been you, right?"

"Ichigo..." Tatsuki's placed her hand on his shoulder. "Are you okay with it?" When he didn't reply, she felt insecurities which should have been buried long ago resurface in her chest; memories from nearly two years ago, when Orihime confessed to Ichigo and was turned down, of the difficult weeks afterwards when they stopped talking because Tatsuki didn't know how to comfort her friend and because she knew that Orihime knew she loved Ichigo too; of the look on Hime's face when she told her that she and Ichigo had begun dating and the pain on his face long after they had been reconciled at every mention of her name that made Tatsuki wonder whether Ichigo had ever loved Orihime, or still did.

As old fears slowly spread, she whispered once more. "Ichigo?"

"Yeah… I'm alright with it." He heaved a sigh and leaned back on his hands. "Ishida's a stiff, but he's a good guy; he'll do right by her."

And his smile, far too rare a sight for something so beautiful, gradually dispelled the dark feelings within her. Stretching her hands high above her head, Tatsuki let herself fall back on the tatami with a grunt, her eyes on the ceiling panel. "Tonight, before I call Hime to congratulate her, I'm going to yell at her for pulling a fast one on me."

Ichigo stretched out beside her, head supported by his hand. "You're going to let Ishida off the hook?"

"No, I'll yell at him too, but not seriously. If I really didn't think he was good for her I would have stopped them long ago when they first started dating." She sighed deeply as she laid one hand over her stomach.

"No regrets?"

"Well, honestly… maybe a little." She tilted her head so that she was facing towards him, a bare hint of a grin on her lips. "Hime catches herself a rich young doctor while I'm stuck here with the same old childhood friend."

Before she could roll away, Ichigo had reached over and grabbed her around the waist, clamping her against his chest as she screamed and laughed, struggling but not really trying to escape. She glimpsed the peculiar cock in his brow that indicated he was amused. "I thought we stopped being childhood friends?"

"Yes… I said something like that, didn't I?" Pressing her face against the warm fabric of his sweater, she took a depth breath before exhaling audibly. "We've changed, haven't we?"

His chin resting on top of her head, Ichigo ran his finger tips along the back of Tatsuki's neck absently. "We're all still friends."

"Not like the way we used to be." Feeling herself calm down in his embrace, she continued. "It started a long time ago, when I first learned that Orihime had a crush on you, when I applied to the same university as you and we ended up renting this apartment together, when she confessed to you, when the two of them started dating afterwards, when I finally…"

Ichigo peered down. "Yes, when you finally what?"

"Oh shut up. You know what happened next."

"Mmmm…" Closing his eyes, the orange-headed young man pressed his smile against the tussle of ink black hair that now extended close to its owner's shoulders. "She'll ask you to be her bride's maid, you know? Things will get hectic."

He felt her quiet laugh vibrate through his body. "He'll ask you to be his best man too."

"You think so? I hope not, he and I would be scowling and glaring at each other the whole time."

"That would be funny, but Hime wouldn't like it."

"The whole ceremony would be weird. Rukia aside, who knows who they'll invite from Soul Society; the menu that they'll decide on for the reception, I mean, just the thought of you wearing a dress…"

A blushing and furious Tatsuki never gave Ichigo the chance to complete his sentence, and as night fell outside, the residents on the same floor heard through the thin walls the familiar sounds of laughter and pandemonium, from the young couple who moved in as friends and became something more; the boy and girl who were forced to grow up far faster than they hoped but realized that change was alright, especially when they were by each other's side.


End file.
